Summary Biography

Member of the Portuguese Parliament, Medical Doctor trained in infectious diseases, Head of Public Health at the Católica University of Portugal and City Councilor of Cascais.

Founder and President of UNITE, a global network of Parliamentarians to End HIV/AIDS, Viral Hepatitis and Tuberculosis by 2030, with the support and under the auspices of UNAIDS.

Awarded by ‘The Economist Intelligence Unit’ as a ‘HCV Change Maker’ (2016). This acknowledgment, attributed to solely six people globally, came in due recognition of Ricardo’s academic work and policy leadership in the field of hepatitis c.

Member of the Portuguese Parliament, currently on a 2nd term (2011-Present), serving as a permanent member of the Parliamentary Health Committee and of the Parliamentary Foreign Affairs Committee and having served as Vice-President of the Foreign Affairs Committee, permanent member of the Parliamentary group on Population and Development, Chair of the all-party Parliamentary HIV/AIDS workgroup and President of the Portuguese-Canadian Parliamentary Friendship Group.

Head of Public Health at the Institute of Health Sciences of the Católica University of Portugal. Guest Lecturer at NOVA Medical School (Infectious Diseases and Microbiology) and at NOVA Information Management School (Coordinator of Sustainable Healthcare Unit), both at NOVA University. Senior Fellow at New Westminster College (BC, Canada) and PhD candidate in Public Health and Health Systems at Maastricht University (The Netherlands). Elected member of the supervisory board of the National Genetic Database Protection Agency. A decade of experience in the health tecnology field as a medical consultant at Glintt Healthcare Solutions, a multinational software house.

City Councilor of Cascais, responsible for local health policy, academic partnerships, international relations (including economic diplomacy), youth (including Cascais European Youth Capital 2018) and employment policies.

In the past, practicing physician during 7 years, including a 5-year Infectious Diseases residency program at the Western Lisbon Hospital Center. Intern in public health (HIV, Hepatitis and STI’s) as a formal collaborator of the World Health Organization Regional Office for Europe, based in Copenhagen (2011). He also worked for 9 years (2009-2016) as a medical consultant at a multinational company in the field of information technologies geared towards healthcare.

Post-graduate studies in many universities in Europe and abroad, among which are Johns Hopkins University (MD, USA), Harvard Medical School (MA, USA), Harvard Kennedy School of Government/IESE (Madrid, Spain), Albert Einstein College of Medicine (NY, USA), Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (Spain) and AESE Business School (Lisbon, Portugal).

Volunteer work related with health and development organizations, such as being Founding President of UNITE – Parliamentarians Network to End HIV/AIDS, Viral Hepatitis and Tuberculosis, member of the Center for Health and Development International Advisory Board (Mangalore, India), member of the Hepatitis B and C Public Policy Association (Brussels, Belgium), among many other affiliations with patient associations in Portugal. Member of the European Leadership Network (www.europeanleadershipnetwork.org), European Young Leaders (Friends of Europe | Europanova), European Young Leaders Forum (BMW Foundation), Emerging Leaders in Environmental and Energy Policy Network (ELEEP | The Atlantic Council), Chatham House (The Royal Institute of International Affairs). Fellow at the ZEIT Stiftung - Fundação Gertúlio Vargas 2015 Latin American Forum on Global Governance and member of the ZEIT Stiftung alumni.

Founder of CREATING HEALTH – Research and Innovation funding, a sustainable nonprofit which has been set up within the Catholic University of Portugal to help capture funding for health innovation and research projects (http://creatinghealth.ics.lisboa.ucp.pt).

Co-founder of the Estoril Conferences, which are focused on the issue of globalization under the motto Global Challenges, Local Answers (www.estorilconferences.com).

Main author of the book “Citizenship for Health” (PT, 2015), which is focused on the role of Citizens in health promotion and disease prevention, and of the book “Strategic Consensus on Integrated Management of Hepatitis C in Portugal” (PT, 2014), among other publications.